


Grief is Weird and Stupid (But Damn Does it Hurt)

by Pixial



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angela gets Angery, Angst but not like heavy angst, Gen, Grief, Hurt/Comfort, Unorthodoxed Use of Medical Equipment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-28
Updated: 2019-10-28
Packaged: 2021-01-04 22:36:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21205193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pixial/pseuds/Pixial
Summary: Angela is no stranger to grief. She might actually be something of an expert.Of course, even experts have things to learn. Especially when it comes to Gabriel Reyes.





	Grief is Weird and Stupid (But Damn Does it Hurt)

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, all! Fictober has stalled but in the meantime, enjoy this piece I wrote for the Let Mercy Say Fuck zine!!

Angela Ziegler was no stranger to grief. Though she would not call herself an expert on the subject, she had certainly felt enough of it to be rather good at expecting its twists and turns. 

First had been her parents, taken from her far too early. She did not remember their faces or voices, but she remembered sitting at the window of Aunt Indrid's house in a terribly stiff and uncomfortable black dress, waiting for their car to turn onto the road and take her home.

(She also remembered how patient the Lindholms were, waiting for her to come to terms with that particular _never again_ in her own time. How they embraced her as their own as she learned how to mourn.)

Later, when she was older and settled into the medical profession, she came to understand that she could not save every patient that crossed her path. It was a dull sort of ache, like a lingering headache that never quite went away but could be ignored with practice.

She didn't grieve for Ana Amari, not like the rest of the world. How could she, when she had been the one to forge the death certificate? But she missed her company and steady nature, and the occasional, cryptic letters were a poor substitute.

(But she looked forward to those letters, as vague as they were. They gave her hope that she would see her friend again.)

Commanders Morrison and Reyes, of course, were blows that took her breath away, for along with them died Overwatch. The whispers of betrayal and sabotage hurt, but she forced herself to carry on. To live following their example.

(And when Jack Morrison knocked on her door two years later, covered in blood and looking like a drowned rat, she took a moment to cry from both joy and sorrow. He was alive, but why? He couldn't, wouldn't tell her.)

So yes, Angela Ziegler was well acquainted with grief and its many forms. Not an expert, but she knew what to expect, how it took hold of her. How to control her reactions.

At least, until _Gabriel motherfucking Reyes_ walked through the doors of her medbay.

At first, she thought it was an attack. Reaper himself had stormed the Watchpoint, and her gun was in her hand immediately. She was halfway to squeezing the trigger before she registered both Jack and Winston behind him, neither appearing to be in any danger.

“Told you to change clothes.” Jack’s gruff voice broke through Angela's shock. Reaper growled in response, but one clawed hand reached up and pulled his mask off.

Angela threw her pistol straight at Reyes’s face.  


He caught the unconventional missile just before it slammed into his nose. “Ziegler, didn’t we ever teach you to not throw your—”

_ **BWONG!** _

Jack moved in a flash, grabbing Angela’s arm before she could swing the bedpan a second time. It already had a remarkable dent in it in the vague shape of Reyes’s head. The man himself was on his ass, rubbing at his jaw. 

“Fair enough,” he said, his gravelled voice full of _admiration_, the ass.

“You son of a bitch!” Angela snarled, jerking her arm from Jack’s hold. “I thought you were dead! We all thought you were dead!”

“You thought I was dead, too,” Jack reasoned.

“_Don’t you even start! _You came back! Asked for help! _He_ apparently _betrayed_ us!” 

“U-undercover, Dr. Ziegler,” Winston put in. “Commander Reyes was apparently, uh…”

“Undercover!?” She felt hot and cold by turns. Reyes was dead. Reyes was _not_ dead. He’d been framed. He was actively working with a terrorist organization. He betrayed them. And now he was _undercover!?_

“Moira.” Reyes looked up at her with eyes that were too, too red.

And just like that, Angela’s rage froze into something sick and sharp. The bedpan fell from her grip, clattering on the floor. “She did this?”

“It was her job,” Reyes said. “From the start. I found out too late. And when they brought me back, I decided to use her tactics against her.”

“Why didn’t you ask for help?” Angela asked, sinking to the ground with him. He was alive. And honestly, all of _this_ being fucking _Moira’s_ fault…

It made far too much sense.

“Too risky.”

“Bullshit.” And with that, she surged forward to hold him. Shaking arms still garbed in leather and claws wrapped around her shoulders, and she shuddered with a sob. He was alive. He was alive, and he was here and she was _furious_ and so _grateful _and he was _crying_ and just so… Just… “You stupid, stubborn asshole. I am so mad at you. As soon as I stop crying, I am going to kick your fucking ass.”

“Yeah,” he said, voice choked. “Yeah. I know.”


End file.
